Stewart Copeland is working on several ambitious projects, and I continue to work with him as his orchestrator and music engraver for G. Schirmer. We’re currently working on a new opera, finishing a new symphony, re-orchestrating his older opera “The Cask of Amontillado”, and adding repertoire to his classical crossover ensemble ParCo. All will be completed in 2015, so it’s a busy and exciting time.
Recording at United Recording (Ocean Way)
Amritha Vaz is a composer for film and television and multi-instrumentalist. Today we were at United Recording (previously JJ Puig’s room at Ocean Way) recording my orchestrations of her arrangents. We were tracking for two different album projects, one by Ensign Broderick and another by Lisa Cuthill. We had a spectacular union orchestra contracted by Peter Rotter, and we couldn’t be happier with the results. Both albums are slated to be released in late 2015.
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- Composer/arranger Amritha Vaz and songwriter Lisa Cuthill at United Recording
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- Our Amritha Vaz string section for the day (winds had left already)
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- Jeremy Borum working at United Recording (previously JJ Puig’s room at Ocean Way)
Orchestrating TWO operas
In a strange twist of coincidence I find myself orchestrating not one but TWO operas at the same time, both of them about 90 minutes long. I am confident this will never again happen in my career. Together they represent several thousand pages of orchestration and score preparation. One is by Stewart Copeland, a project that we began in late 2014. The other is by Mark Abel, also begun last year.
This month we made a big push to finish Mark’s opera because we will be producing a full orchestra recording of it in July of this year. The scores are now in three massive books, the piano reduction in another book, and our planning for the recording sessions is beginning in earnest. It will be very fun to hear this piece come to life in a few months! It will be conducted by Benjamin Makino and the musicians will be contracted by Timothy Loo.
Ben Hur Chicago a huge success
The recent show showing the 1923 version of Ben Hur, with a new Stewart Copeland score played by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra was a great success, and more opportunities are coming from it. The thousands of pages of music in our second edition print were trouble free and didn’t prompt a single question from the orchestra, which I’m very happy about. We got overwhelmingly positive reviews from publications such as BMI, CSO Sounds, Chicago Splash, The Chigago Sun Times, and The Examiner.
I was Stewart’s orchestrator and music copyist, and I did all the score prep for the premiere in Norfolk, VA at the Virginia Arts Festival in April 2014.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJ9AEVjQGek
Ben Hur will play at Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Our performance of Ben Hur was so successful at the Virginia Arts Festival that now we’re doing the show with one of the best orchestras in the world, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. The film is beautifully restored, the orchestra very tightly synched with the film, and the orchestra impressive. This is a small video segment from our show in Norfolk. I was the music copyist and engraver for Schirmer and Stewart Copeland.
Jordan Blair and Rewind Publishing
I just completed a set of scores for Jordan Blair, the head of Rewind Publishing, for a large trailer music recording session that will happen in Europe tomorrow with the Prague Philharmonic. Rewind does high-end top-notch work and it was a pleasure to work with Jordan on this project.
Mark Abel opera orchestrations
I’m beginning yet another project with Mark Abel, this time a full length opera for chamber orchestra. For the moment we are only making rehearsal scores for the vocalists, but it will not be long before I am orchestrating the whole opera with him. He has a very unique musical voice and it’s always a pleasure to work with him.
World Of Warcraft orchestrations
It was a pleasure to once again be a part of the orchestration team with Penka Kouneva as we prepared for more World Of Warcraft scoring sessions. Game composer Neal Acree writes fantastic epic music, and I always enjoy being a part of such massive large-scale projects.
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic
Composer Stewart Copeland wrote a percussion concerto that is being performed May 23 by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. Part of a concert series called Bringing Down The House, this performance will be the world premiere of “Poltroons In Paradise”. It’s literally bringing down the house, as it is the last performance before a demolition and renovation of Philharmonic Hall! The Philharmonic will perform it again May 25 at the Perth Concert Hall in Perth, Scotland. I was the music engraver for Stewart and G. Schirmer, who is the publisher of the sheet music.